Helbig, TX

Helbig, originally on the Gulf, Beaumont and Kansas City Railway slightly north of Beaumont in northern Jefferson County, was established in 1900, when the Forest Lumber Company built a sawmill at the site. The community was named for a railroad auditor. A post office was established there in 1901, but in 1903 the Industrial Lumber Company purchased the sawmill plant, and the next year the Helbig mail was routed through Rosedale. The sawmill installations were moved to Seale, Louisiana, in 1905. A residential community ultimately developed around the short siding that remained, and later the area was incorporated within the Beaumont city limits. The Helbig School, a coeducational institution for Blacks, had opened in the area by 1906. The school was also known as Helbig College. It was established by Monroe E. Robinson, a pastor from Beaumont and a representative of the General Bowen Missionary Baptist District Association. The preparatory and industrial school, which at one time had a faculty of twelve serving 100 students, may have operated as late as 1940.